Elephants can't hide forever (8 page)

“Now you’re well and truly rested we can begin,” said the giant as the two henchmen delivered vicious kicks into Mike’s groin. They unshackled him and dragged him up two
flights of stairs to a kitchen area, where they shoved him into a wooden chair, tied him securely and removed the hood which had become part of Mike in recent days. As Mike tried to focus through
the one good eye he had left, he suddenly noticed on the chair directly in front of him was a man not dissimilar to himself, with a broken face tied to a chair. Both men looked at each other in
abject astonishment. Spiderman laughed.

“We like to do things in twos round here,” he spat. “You two bastards can have the pleasure of watching each other have your fingers cut off, then your ears, then your toes,
then your eyes then your bollocks, but I think your balls can come off with the blow torch, just for a bit of variety. Allow me to introduce you to each other. Mr SAS man, meet Mr Parachute
Regiment man.” Both men starred at each other incredulously. The Para, Toby Wakefield, had a couple of weeks earlier been on patrol, discreetly observing an official IRA funeral. As the
procession of hooded terrorists and mourners had been making their way down the Falls Road in Belfast, Toby just happened to stray past an alleyway where he lingered for a split second too long.
Out of the depths of the alley, an opportunist snatch squad of republicans grabbed him from behind and disappeared behind one of the many doorways that littered the alley. By the time Toby’s
mates had realised he was missing, and had ripped every door in the street of their hinges, Toby was in the republic and awaiting his fate.

The stench from the two men in one room was almost unbearable but the three IRA men, all sadists, were relishing the sport they were about to undertake, and didn’t appear to notice
anything untoward.

“Right, lets get started” said the red -haired man “Either of you two got anything to say?” he inquired of Mike and Toby. Neither man said a word, if anything they were
taking some solace in each other’s predicament. One of the tattooed man’s disciples opened a cupboard under the sink and produced a set of industrial bolt croppers, he looked at the two
prisoners and flipped a coin, heads SAS first, tails the Para. The other two found this highly amusing. The coin landed and tails showed. Mike had kind of hoped he’d be first, purely for
selfish reasons, to get it over with and not witness what he was about to receive.

With no more talk the Irishman who had not yet spoken named Declan spread Toby’s hand open and selected the first finger of his left hand, staring into his eyes he secured the tool around
the base of Toby’s little finger and gradually tightened his grip. As the finger fell to the floor Toby thankfully passed out and didn’t give the fenian bastards the satisfaction of
screaming. Pleased with his work, the IRA man let the enormity of the moment register with Mike and asked him one time: “Anything to say now?”

Mike thought for a moment; if he started talking could he put off the dreadful events that were unfolding? He concluded not, and just looked into the ceiling. The man named Declan was pleased
there was to be no delay, not at this early stage anyhow.
When these two bastards see the blow torch they’ll be singing for their lives then,
he thought. He took Mike’s left
hand, selected the little finger, looked into Mike’s eyes, placed the cutter round the base, exerted just enough pressure to ensure maximum pain and squeezed.

As Mikes finger came off, the world caved in; at first Mike thought it was the sensation of his amputation, but quickly realised salvation had come. The windows flew through the kitchen, as did
the door; simultaneously three CS gas canisters burst open, the main door caught Spiderman full in the chest but before he hit the deck six bullets from an MP5 sub-machine gun had entered his gut,
and he was dead before the floor greeted him The other two IRA men fared no better. Declan took twenty two bullets through the head and torso, and the remaining terrorist was cut in half by the
automatic fire of the MP5.

Four hours later Mike and Toby were in the field hospital at Bessbrook barracks. Both had identical bandages on their respective left hands. Word had got round of their ordeal, and even for the
respectful soldiers inhabiting the barracks, people were finding excuses to come and see the two heroes, as they were now being labelled.

The next morning a land rover pulled up alongside the hospital, and a colonel from the Parachute Regiment entered.

“Morning, Toby.” he said “Let’s get you home where you belong, don’t want you mixing with this lot any more than you have to, they will get you into trouble if
you’re not careful.”

Toby looked at Mike. “Not even time for a beer then,” he said.

“Doesn’t look like it,” replied Mike, “but mark my words, when we next meet, the first ones on me.”

Little did he know there would be a next time, and little did he know the circumstances under which that beer would be drunk.

From that day on Mike Tobin became known amongst the elite cadre of Special Forces, the SAS, as Nine Fingers, quickly abbreviated to Nine. He had won his spurs.

Danny Gallagher sat in the living room of his modest but comfortable home in the village of Goudhurst, Kent. He had a lot on his mind and sleep was not going to come easy that
night. Tomorrow morning he was going to drive to the affluent Hertfordshire town of Harpenden, where he was to rendezvous with three other conspirators, and at precisely 11.45am they intended to
relieve the St. Albans branch of Barclays Bank of what he had calculated to be several hundred thousand pounds. By 4pm he was due on the Eurostar from Folkestone to Paris, and then booked on the
9pm flight out of Charles de Gaulle bound for Marrakesh, where he intended to stay for three months until the heat of the blag had died down. This was never going to be a payday to match the Brinks
Mat but even so it would yield enough for Danny to escape forever. The morning’s raid had been planned with meticulous precision and his accomplices chosen with the utmost caution.
Danny’s brother Sammy was already ensconced in the Glen Eagles Hotel, Harpenden High Street, booked in under an assumed name. He looked every part the travelling businessman and this was his
first blag since Danny had visited his pub on the Costa Del Sol all those years ago. Sammy’s business on the Costa del crime had nosedived in recent years as the criminal fraternity had
become bored with Spain and sought more glamorous hidey holes in the Caribbean and South America. Like Danny, Sammy was committed to one last blag and then wanted to disappear for good.

This was, however, not what Danny was contemplating as he sat alone staring into space. His thoughts were focused on the years since the incarceration of John Illes and Brian Robinson. He had
evaded capture following their arrest, but never a day had passed without him looking over his shoulder, either for the old bill to come calling, or worse, an assassin’s bullet in the back of
the neck. Immediately after the robbery, it became clear that the bullion was not going to be as easy to move as Mouse had first thought. No-one within the immediate circle of the robber’s
acquaintances had any experience of dealing with gold, indeed up until then armed robbery had been a strictly cash only business, and so the call had gone out far and wide for help. The call that
the Mouse had made all those years ago had been to a shadowy figure in London’s underworld, to a man known as The Fox. For thirty years The Fox had been one of the senior figures in British
organised crime and Mouse figured if anybody could help it would be The Fox. Mouse was right, The Fox was able to contact two of London’s most notorious gangs, to help move the gold. One
accepted, and one wisely declined, figuring anyone touching the bars would get seriously burned. Thus the gold found itself being distributed through a network of villains, some of which were known
to Mouse, and some not, but as long as Mouse kept a stranglehold of the situation it was the best he could do.

Following the arrest of Mouse and Brian Robinson, things changed. The initial divvy up of the bullion had occurred ten days before the arrest of Mouse, that is to say, the gold which was handed
out was for safekeeping rather than personal usage. With Bones Logan and Herbie Sparks being entrusted with a thousand bars each, Danny also got a thousand bars and the two Petermen a thousand
between them. The remainder was split between Mouse, Danny, and Brian Robinson. When news of the arrests broke, panic set in amongst the initial team. Would Mouse sing to save his arse? No-one
could say, but everyone knew he would effectively be facing a life sentence if found guilty and under those circumstances, who wouldn’t.

Ironically the two Petermen were the first to crack; they figured Mouse would be away for such a long stretch that he was effectively rendered harmless, and in any case would have more on his
mind coping with the rest of his life in the shovel than to worry about his gold. They both knew many villains who they figured would take the gold for cash; they could then disappear back into the
world at large never to be heard of again. So within three days of Mouse’s capture, a white Hertz rental van pulled off the highway between The Wake Arms and Theydon Bois, an area known as
Epping Forest, and the two safebreakers entered the forest, went to the spot where their entrusted cargo was buried, dug it up, loaded the van and hit the road north to Scotland.

Twenty hours later in a derelict warehouse in Glasgow’s East End, the exchange took place. The scene could have been taken from a hundred gangster movies, with the two Petermen in one
corner and the Glasgow Mafia, totalling six men and all heavily tooled up in another. Whilst the Englishmen were extremely vulnerable, they had worked with these Glaswegian hoodlums in the past, so
were fairly confident they wouldn’t get rolled over. As it happened they had nothing to fear; the transaction completed, they left Glasgow 800k richer and the boys from Barlinnie returned to
their haunts with a thousand gold bars valued by Johnson Matthey at 3.8 million pounds. All happy then, apart of course from prisoner 134859 Illes of her Majesties Prison Parkhurst.

It took just two weeks for word of the betrayal to reach A wing. John Illes was being turned over by those he trusted and if he didn’t send a message out very quickly he knew the empire
would collapse and there would be nothing left of the loot within six months, let alone when he got out.

Mouse realised he had to get out of jail sooner rather than later, no matter what the cost. He acted with as much haste as the judicial system would allow, and within twenty four hours he was
sitting in the Governor’s office facing Chief Superintendant Frank Carter.

“Well, here I am, John” said the Sweeney boss. “What is you want?” he asked, pretty sure he had already guessed,

Mouse gritted his teeth. “I want to turn Queen’s” he said “I’ll give you everyone, but I want out, I want out now, and I need £100,000 grand to get
lost.”

Frank Carter stared at Mouse, and shook his head slowly.

“Honour amongst thieves is it then, John?” he smirked. “Let me tell you” he continued, “the return of Jesus Christ is more likely to happen than you getting out of
here. You knock off twenty six million quid and then think you can grass up a few mates and get off the hook! I don’t think so. Listen, your assets are about to be seized, you are soon going
back to the Bailey to be ordered to pay back the twenty six million, that’s with a capital M. Should you ever be released, or if you try to contact me again. I won’t come. Warden, take
this trash back to his cell.”

The door slammed shut leaving Mouse stunned and very alone.

Word soon started to filter through the underworld that John Illes had been ripped off, and that the gold was being held by at least a dozen crooks, and the heat was intense. Danny Gallagher had
been raided twice, nothing found, but the old bill had got their message across: the heat wouldn’t stop until the gold was found and the remaining robbers reunited with Mouse.

Oddly enough, just like the two safecrackers but without knowing it, Danny had also buried his stash in Epping Forest. If future generations ever dug up the Forest they would assume it was some
ancient burial ground, what with all the bodies from gangland wars deposited there, and the hidden booty from blags where the villains for one reason or another never got back to claim their
ill-gotten gains. Danny, however, being the shrewd fellow he was, had never set foot in Essex since he hid his bars; furthermore until someone told him John Illes was dead he was not about to let
greed jeopardise his own life.

Six months passed. The two safecrackers had long gone, and Eric Logan and Herbie Sparks found themselves one evening sitting in the garden of the Cricketers public house just off Bromley common.
Eric was the first to broach the subject.

“Herbie,” he said, out of earshot of the surrounding families enjoying some early spring sun. “Mouse isn’t coming out, the other two have sold their share and fucked off,
we can wait till the cows come home, or we can offload our bit and do the same.”

Herbie replied, “That’s all well and good, but even in stir Mouse is not going to sit back and let us steal his gold. I’ve already heard a whisper that there’s a contract
out for Flint and Batter, the Petermen”

“Well I say we take a chance,” stated Bones. “I know who the bloke is in Hatton Garden who’s been taking the stuff, and I know that they’ve set up a hooky company
down in Bristol to smelt it down. If we just sit on this stuff for the next twenty years we’ll probably get sussed in any case, so we’ve nothing to lose.”

“Apart from our lives,” observed Herbie.

“Well, how about I go to Hatton Garden, make a couple of enquiries and then make a decision?” asked Eric.

“Agreed,” was Herbie’s hesitant response.

It was soon after this clandestine meeting that Danny received his summons. It came in the form of an official envelope, and although Danny knew the contents he still felt desperate. The
envelope contained a Visiting Order from Her Majesties Prison Parkhurst, with Danny’s name on. He was requested to visit John Illes, currently holidaying on the he Isle Of Wight, and the
invitation was for the following Tuesday. This was the first word Danny had heard from Mouse since the arrest, and he had been just starting to hope Mouse had resigned himself to his fate, but
obviously this was not the case, and ominously Mouse was not the type of bloke to send out a Visiting Order because he was lonely. So it was with trepidation that Danny travelled to the Island that
next Tuesday. He was sitting in the visitor’s room, feeling sick with the smell of the prison that all old lags hated so much, when Mouse was escorted in. In all fairness, Mouse didn’t
look too bad - unusually for prison life he hadn’t lost weight and he was yet to develop the dead eyes so common with lifers. After the usual pleasantries, Mouse spoke in a lowered tone: